The present invention relates to body armor systems worn for protection against projectile threats such as rifle and handgun bullets, and shrapnel.
Persons exposed to projectile threats, such as police officers and soldiers, may seek a certain level of protection by wearing armored clothing. Low velocity projectiles such as handgun rounds, fragmentation rounds from a grenade or mortar, and miscellaneous shrapnel may be countered by so-called “soft armor.” Soft armor is worn in the form of jackets, vests, etc. which are composed of assemblies of ballistic fabric such as those formed from DuPont Kevlar® fibers. The soft armor is often fabricated as flexible panels which are received within pockets or pouches formed in fabric vests or jackets. In more serious threat situations, where higher velocity rifle rounds must be countered, soft armor has typically been supplemented with hard armor fabricated of rigid plates of ceramic, polymer, or metal.
Body armor can contribute to the safety of a soldier in combat situations, but it is important that it not significantly detract from the soldier's ability to perform combat tasks, and that it not be an impediment to providing assistance to the soldier in the event of injury. Thus, while a body armor system should be securely mounted to the soldier, it should be rapidly removable in an emergency. In some systems, an emergency release pin is provided which engages with lacing held in place by eyelets which are threaded on the pin. By rapidly withdrawing the pin, the body armor can by opened up and the wearer expeditiously extricated. Yet this arrangement can result in the lacing and released eyelets becoming tangled or disarrayed, making reassembly of the armor a time-consuming task.
It is furthermore important that the structure of the body armor should not interfere with the soldier's weapons use. A significant fraction of soldiers are left-handed, and thus the configuration of some body armor must be different depending on the soldier's handedness. To efficiently make use of resources, it is desirable that a single armor system be able to accommodate both left and right handed wearers.
What is needed is a body armor system which can be readily configured for different users, and which can be rapidly disassembled and reassembled.